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Investment banks risk missing out on tens of billions of dollars of revenues because they are not properly integrated across their geographically diverse businesses, a new report has warned.

The paper, by IBM and the Economist Intelligence Unit, explodes the myth that investment banks are globally integrated, arguing that they have global presence but are not organised globally.

A survey of 850 financial markets executives found that 93% said the companies that they worked for were not “operating in a global fashion” while 80% failed to name a bank they believed to be global.

Two thirds of respondents rated the ability of their company to operate as a globally integrated enterprise as poor to medium for nine attributes, including management, architecture, knowledge sharing and governance.

Suzanne Dence, a financial markets leader at IBM and an author of the report, said: “We came into this research with the hypothesis that financial markets firms are global but our findings suggest the opposite. While many may look global – they have succeeded in creating a global brand – there is limited global integration behind the scenes in terms of operations and client servicing.”

Some 86% of bankers quizzed said that “globalisation will be an important factor in their firms’ strategies within five years” while 93% of the 107 corporate clients questioned agreed that globalisation was necessary.

Research by IBM and the EIU suggests that worldwide investment assets will double to almost $300 trillion (€220 trillion) by 2015 and rise to $700 trillion by 2025, 60% of this growth coming from non-traditional or “prospect” markets.

The report stresses the importance of “aligning portfolio with emerging profit pools”. Dence acknowledges that investment banks are “saddled with significant, fragmented regulations” but said that there is more they can do.

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She added: “Firms must take a more scientific approach to opportunities. Banks have been piling into China to make money and into India to save it – just another example of the industry's herd mentality – but firms have not properly quantified these opportunities.”

Dence also urged financial markets firms to become more “extroverted” to understand what their clients want and what they will pay for.

“The second aspect of extroversion is that bigger is not necessarily beautiful and partnerships with vendors or, even, competitors is yet another way of accessing markets or new opportunities,” she said.

One investment banker polled said: “We are the greatest navel contemplators of all time because we have made money hand over fist. We are also the most introverted industry, keeping information proprietary.”